1. INTRODUCTION:
World economies have recognized information technology as an effective tool for catalyzing economic activity’s inefficient governance and developing human resources. They have made significant investments and successfully integrated them with the development process, thereby reaping their society’s benefits. In India, these developments have also impacted the industrial, education, service, and Government sectors, and their influence on various applications is increasingly felt later.
As the digital economy era evolves, the concept of governance has assumed significant importance. E-Governance has consequently become an accepted methodology involving Information Technology in improving transparency, providing information speedily to all citizens, improving administration efficiency, and improving public services such as transportation, power, health, water, security, and municipal services.
India has been harnessing the benefits provided by the Information & Communication.
Technologies to provide integrated governance, reach citizens faster, provide efficient services, and empower citizens through access to information. The aim is to redefine governance in the ICT age to provide Smart Governance. In this direction, several significant initiatives have been taken at the Centre and the State levels. At the Central level, the Government has extensively promoted the use of IT in management.
Its internal processes have drawn up a ‘Minimum Agenda of e-Governance.’ The
Ministries and departments are required to spend 2 to 3 percent of their annual budgets on IT-related activities.
The Government has enacted the IT Act 2000, which provides legal status to the information and transactions carried on the net. Several State Governments have also taken.
Various innovative steps to promote e-government have drawn up a road map for IT implementation and service delivery to citizens online. The applications that have been implemented are targeted toward providing G2B, G2C, and B2C services, emphasizing the use of the local language.
2. DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY’S INITIATIVES:
As part of the increased thrust on e-governance, the Ministry of Communications &
Information Technology, Department of Information Technology, Government of India
Has set up a Centre for e-Governance (CEG) at its premises – Electronics Nike tan in New Delhi. The Centre, the first of its kind in the country,
showcases several e-Governance applications and solutions that have been successfully
Deployed in various states and offers other technical consultation services, proof of concept, and thematic presentations. Conducting programs for creating awareness among decision-makers in the central and State Governments and helping them define and
- implementing process and policy changes for effective e-governance are other important
- Objectives of the Centre. The primary activities of the Centre are:
- To showcase the best practices in the area of Electronic Governance, which would
- encompass technology, processes as well as public policies
- Conduct programs for creating awareness among decision-makers in the Central and State Governments
- Demonstrate the feasibility of Electronic Governance to decision-makers through
- Workshops, demonstration programs, video/teleconferencing, etc.
- Help the Central and State Governments define and implement process and policy changes.
To enrich the repository of best practices through continuous interaction with subject matter experts from India and abroad.
The Centre also draws upon leading companies, technical institutions, and business partners in India and abroad and helps initiate projects to address specific needs. The Centre continuously strives to establish strong links with similar institutions worldwide to enrich the repository of best practices through interaction and
Participation.
3. SOME E-GOVERNANCE PROJECTS/APPLICATIONS OPERATIONAL ACROSS INDIA:
3.1 Bhoomi (Land Records)
Bhoomi is a self-sustainable e-governance project for the computerized delivery of 20 million rural land records to 6.7 million farmers through 177 Government-owned kiosks in the Indian State of Karnataka, which has eliminated red tape and corruption in the issue of land title records and is fast becoming the backbone for credible IT-enabled Government services for the rural population.
3.2 Stamps Registration and Archiving (SARITA)
The Stamps and Registration Department of a State is typically one of the top revenue earners for any Government. The stamp and registration software provides an efficient government-citizen interface and enables enhanced revenue earnings for the Stamps and Registration operation. The heart of this application consists of.
Of the Registration and Valuation module. Other modules are the Networking and Scanning modules that enable the exchange of information securely across departments and “electronic copying” of the registered documents, thereby allowing the original document’s return within a few minutes of presentation.
3.3 Versatile Online Information for Citizen Empowerment (VOICE)
Municipalities face the challenge of providing various citizen services.VOICE caters to these challenges through the use of state-of-the-art information technology. In addition to computerizing day-to-day operations, VOICE provides a powerful Community and empowers citizens. This application ensures quick, transparent, and efficient administration at a lower operating cost.
With increased revenue collections.
3.4 e-Seva
Seva is the first-of-its-kind service in the country, providing a wide spectrum of citizen-friendly services that save citizens from running around various departments. The services offered are Payment of Utility Bills, Registration of Birth/Death, Issue of Birth/Death certificates, Permits/licenses, Reservations, etc.
There are 35 Seva centers (with 280 service counters) spread over the Twin Cities and
Ranga Reddy District.
3.5 Gyandoot
Gyandoot is an intranet in the tribal district of Dhar in Central India, connecting rural Cybercafes catering to the everyday needs of the masses. It is a community-based, highly cost-effective, and financially self-reliant approach to bringing the benefits of Information Technology to the doorsteps of tribal villagers. The objective of the Gyandoot project has been to establish a community-owned, innovative, and sustainable
information technology project in the most poverty-stricken and tribal-dominated rural
Areas. The project is designed to cater to the social, economic, and development needs of the
Villagers through an innovative G2C model. There are around 1600 villages in Dhar district and 80 information kiosks/cyber offices(Soochanalayas). Each booth caters to about 25 to 30 villages. The entire network of 31 kiosks covers 311 Panchayats (village committees), over 600 towns, and a population of around half a million (nearly 50% of the entire district).
3.6 e-Choupal
ITC’s International Business Division, a cost-effective alternative supply chain system that deals directly with farmers to buy products for exports, is transforming into a meta market for rural India. The tobacco giant
- has already set up over 700 couples covering 3,800 villages in four states
- — which include Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, and Andhra
- Pradesh — dealing with products ranging from soya bean, coffee, aquaculture, and wheat.
3.7 VidyaVahini
This portal allows schools, teachers, and students nationwide to express and share their creative and academic potential via the Internet. The portal aims to create such an environment by providing content development, deployment, and collaboration. Shiksha India – a
non-profit organization – is working in partnership with the Ministry of Information
Technology in the project Vidya Vahini and Ministry of Human Resources under the CLASS scheme aims to connect 60.000 schools (approximately 20 million students) across the country in the next five years.
3.8 Aarakshi
Aarakshi is an intranet-based system for the Jaipur City Police to facilitate FIRs, criminal records, vehicle thefts, missing persons’ records, etc. It is like a private & closed user group accessible to only authorized personnel. Its potential users are all field-level officers of the city, such as police stations, circle officers, SPs, and even district collectors.
3.9 Website
website (Web-based Citizen-IT Interface) is an e-governance project to build the citizen-IT interface for services offered by the district administration at Fatehgarh Sahib in Punjab. It provides a web-based interface to citizens seeking assistance from the district administration and provides complete workflow automation in the District Commissioners’ office. It is an information dissemination system designed to help the public get information about various government schemes, such as eligibility criteria, procedures, contact addresses, downloadable forms, etc. These include issuing certificates
such as death/birth, caste, rural area, arms license, permission for
conferences/rallies, etc., and benefits from socio-economic schemes. The information about
Various methods and procedures, the status of an application, etc., can be found through the web interface available at the intranet counters at developmental block/revenue tehsil and kiosks.
3.10 Drishtee
Drishtee is a unique socio-technological effort toward creating an Information backbone in Indian Villages. Drishtee is a public limited company providing IT-enabled, fee-based services to villagers through community-owned kiosks. It is a platform for rural networking and marketing services to promote e-governance, education, health, and allied IT-based services. Its services include access to government programs & benefits, market-related information, and private information exchanges & transactions.
4. E-GOVERNANCE IN TAMILNADU:
- The Government has taken as a policy to promote e-governance initiatives to
- ensure transparent, speedy, and responsive delivery of government services to the
- Citizens. E-governance initiatives were taken in major departments like Registration,
- Revenue, Transport, etc. The Electronic Delivery of Services (EDS) is receiving a lot
- Of thrust. The payment of utility payment service charges of TNEB, Metrowater, and
- Chennai Corporation can be affected by the EDS centers. To promote e-governance
- in the Government during 2004-05, a sum of Rs.2357.52 lakhs has
- been provided in the State Budget under Part-II (new) schemes for 2004-05, of which
- Rs.1836.52 lakhs are provided under Plan schemes and Rs.521 lakhs under Non-
- Plan towards hardware and software for the Departments of Commercial Taxes,
- Registration, Treasuries & Accounts, Survey & Settlement, BC & MBC, Town and
- Country Planning & Adi-Dravida Welfare, etc.
- 4.1 Tamil Nadu e-governance Mission:
- As part of the increased thrust on e-governance, the IT department is setting up
- an e-governance Directorate exclusively to work on the Policy and Planning of
- Information & Communication Technology initiatives of the Government and also to
- augment the e-governance initiatives and projects of the Government of Tamil
- Nada. As a first initiative, the e-governance cell at ELCOT, in the name
- and style of “TN e-governance Mission,” which will form a part of the
- Directorate later. TN’s e-governance Mission, from its inception, has been
- scouting around for the best e-governance practices the world over for adoption in the
- e-governance project initiatives of the Government to provide electronic delivery of
- services to the citizens at a reasonable cost and for improvement of Government –
Citizen Interface.
The Tamil Nadu Government has decided to give a major push to its e-governance initiatives. In addition to constituting panels at three different levels to implement the National e-Governance Action Plan (NeGAP), it is also planning to appoint a consultant to conduct a study and prepare an information and communication technology (ICT) road map for e-governance.
Besides floating a global tender for the consultant’s appointment, the Government has constituted a State Apex Committee (SAC) to oversee and provide policy direction to NeGAP and ensure inter-ministerial coordination.
A state e-government Group (SeG) will provide overall direction, standardization, and consistency through program management of the State’s e-governance initiatives.
The SAC will be headed by the Chief Secretary, with the Information Technology Secretary as the Chief Information Officer and the Managing Director of Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu (ELCOT) as the member secretary.
The SeG will have the Development Commissioner and Principal Secretary (Finance) as the chairman and the director of the to-be-created directorate of e-Governance as the member secretary. The IT secretary, who will also be a member of the SeG, will advise the Government on IT trends and coordinate technology utilization.
The deputy director-general of the National Information Centre (NIC) will also be a member of the SeG, providing technical expertise mon, storing new technologies, and assessing their potential for use in the e-governance program.
The SeG will function as a permanent advisory body to develop and implement processes for managing programs such as conflict management, audits, knowledge management, financial management, risk management, project planning, and monitoring, and institutionalize e-governance processes and tools.
The e-governance groups will also be set up at state government department levels, with the department’s secretary as the chairman, to help the departments prepare detailed project reports, business process re-engineering, change management, financial sustainability, technology expertise, and project implementation.
5. SOME OF THE IMPORTANT E-GOVERNANCE PROJECTS IN TAMILNADU:
5.1 TamilNadu InfoSystem on Land Administration and Management (Tamil NILAM):
TamilNILAM is an important e-governance initiative of the Government of Tamil Nadu. Under this program, all the taluk offices in Tamil Nadu have been provided with computers.
- The major applications of these systems are,
- § Land Records
- § Old Age Pension Management
- § Certificates Management
- § Public Grievances Redressal
- § Personal and Payroll system
Twenty-nine taluks are provided with a touch screen for public use. The services offered by it are,
Landowners can view their Land ownership and obtain a copy of the Chitta Exact.
Birth and Death certificate particulars can be viewed, and a copy can be obtained.
Old age pension details can also be maintained.
The welfare Scheme of the Revenue Department is explained with details on how to avail of these services and benefits.
5.2 Simplified and Transparent Administration of Registration(STAR):
Simplified and Transparent Administration of Registration is a Citizen-centric application implemented at 300 sub-registrar offices in Tamil Nadu. With the computerized system, the issue of the Encumbrance certificate has become quicker and easier. The documents are scanned and archived. The Data will be maintained in Tamil. The NIC Tamil Nadu state Unit developed the Application software with the team’s team’s active involvementfrom the Registration Department. The ELCOT has carried out the hardware procurement and installation.
5.3 Treasury Computerization:
Treasury computerization is one of the earliest e-governance projects developed for the Government of Tamil Nadu. Now, the system is used in the following offices,
- § 29 District treasuries
- § 205 sub treasuries
- § 7 Pay and Accounts office
- § Pension Pay Office, Chennai
The Daily transaction is captured in batch mode at sub-treasuries and consolidated at the district treasuries. The monthly account prepared using the district treasuries, pay, and funds department are submitted to the AG’s office.
6. Conclusion:
Although e-government has been around since the 1990s, many developing countries have not fully reaped its benefits because they lack the key conditions for it to thrive:
- · healthy political and regulatory environments,
- · Well-developed IT infrastructure, and
- · a large pool of Internet users.
Skeptics believe that e-government is not an appropriate tool for low-income countries with limited technical capability. However, despite this shortcoming, some developing countries, such as India, have successfully implemented e-government in certain areas.
